The Android 16 Show

So Abner, I want to ask you a question. It's a burning question I've had over the last couple of days. Is the Android show one of Google's new keynotes or is it slightly less than that? Calling it a keynote would be generous, I think. Yeah, it was more a presentation, I guess, rather than a keynote. A keynote in the traditional sense of live demos and people speaking on a stage. This was a recorded bit. It felt more like...

Apple's recent style of keynotes that are no longer live that are pre-recorded. It had those vibes, which is par for the course of the Android show. The developer-focused Android shows for the past few years or so, it's par for the course in that regard. But I don't know. I think I was expecting... Something more keynote-y in the traditional IO sense. And regardless, just about 20 minutes. Actual announcement lies maybe 20 minutes.

with a lot of transitions in between. It was very much a show, as promised, as billed in the name, but I think my expectations were something more keynote-y, and it very much wasn't that.

Do you know what it reminded me of? It reminded me a little bit of the launch night in. Was that Pixel 5 era? Yeah. It kind of felt a lot like that. Did they do an online for Pixel 6? I can't even remember, but 2021, but it feels like such a long time ago. Time was just... evaporating but yeah it felt a bit launch night inny in that it was like well yeah pre-recorded just i'm not i don't know how i feel about it i feel like sometimes the keynotes

I know some people love them. I'm kind of indifferent. I'm more like, just give me the product specifications, give me the price, I'm happy. The rest is, we will take it apart in post, if that makes sense.

I mean, I guess when we start to think about launch events and stuff, made by Google's a little bit more in-depth in that they go into the true ins and outs. But obviously the standout is... This new Android 16 redesign that we just keep banging on and banging on and banging on about. But I guess that's our MO. What do you think so far of what we've seen that's like official official, if that makes sense, and is coming soon? Yeah, it's...

It looks, it's, I guess what we got was more of the story behind why they're doing it. And I'm very glad. I think we were asking about the transparency, the blur last time. The official reason is the blur in the recent multitasking and in the notifications shade was to provide some separation to convey where you are in the operating system at all times.

Sure, still doesn't really work with dynamic cover, but neither here nor there. It's, yeah, so they focused on the animations. The animations were a big focus. want to emphasize how their little delightful touches here and there, which is the main reason for material to be expressive. And I think that sold it. Overall, it just looks very cohesive together. It's Google wants to add expressiveness. Yeah, it's...

Expressiveness is an interesting word for it. We've been living with it for the past two weeks now, but it's...

Do you think it's the right word? I'm kind of... I get what they're trying to say. I mean, I'm an animation guy. You know that as well. But I think all of these little extra touches to me is... And I don't think it's... I wouldn't call it expressive. I'd call it... i mean call it what it is attention to detail i think if you can have an animation that works from effectively even well the dream is to have the animation work from pre

interact interaction to the end of the interaction i think this kind of creates this this and i know and i know obviously a cliche thing for specifically pixel those days in air quotes buttery smooth which i don't really like that terminology but that's probably what everyone seems to

almost like lean into in terms of pixel interface this feels like that next step like we've had smooth pixel interfaces for a while it's that little extra attention to detail that's going to make the biggest difference and these are the kind of touches that google kind of Maybe they've seen iOS doing it for a long time and even One UI and OxygenOS are another good example. We've seen those OEMs, OnePlus, Oppo and Samsung kind of like...

they get given the tools to make their own Android versions, and even they're putting their own actual touches to it. So I'm glad that Google's going to go, has kind of read the rumor a little bit, I guess. Maybe that's a bit harsh, but...

having all these little extra touches is really really nice like what do you what do you think in terms of like is this too little too late in some respects i know we're going to have this really strange transition period now when we have android 16 with barely anything in it and then

whatever qpr1 is is going to be a huge major thing like do you think that i personally think it's aligning for pixel 10 obviously which is obvious like i'm not yeah i'm not pulling trees on the pixel 10 um first device and Maybe a week or two later, all the other devices will get it with QPR One. I think the word Google used was springy. They are natural springy animations.

To read the quote, to bring a moment of delight to everyday routines. Again, I think I need to feel this because you need to actually use it because it's... you can appreciate it much more when you're actually using it, of course. But from what we have right now, it's... the high the high it's everywhere it appears to be consistent it's system-wide so that's good that's a very good start to all this and um

Yeah, the system itself, the quick settings, the notification shade, just a system UI, it appears cohesive. It appears it touched every single surface. Google didn't really talk about the status bar icons, which is something you live with every single day. So, but yeah.

So the core of it is there, and I think that will be the big update come a few months. So the other thing they had was live updates. We finally got to see. live updates in full it's on the always on display which is nice it's on top of your notification shade when you're just using your phone it's a pill next to your next to your time

And when you tap it, you get the full notification. So I think I've been really waiting to see what the full experience is like before judging it. But so far, it looks pretty good. it's probably not like the dynamic iron level of interactivity or like it's like the dynamic iron is very prominent it's hardware obviously So software can't compete with that, but it looks... I think it will be fun when apps adopt it. I think the...

I mean, live updates is a great example. I think when we look at this, this definitely puts into perspective, like obviously we saw stuff, I think we mentioned it last week, that having leaked things ahead of time can almost give you... Sometimes a false sense of what you should expect, if that makes sense. There's a lot of these things now that look cleaner than obviously a pre-release build potentially, or like people enabling things that are in progress.

The fact of the matter is that we have something that looks way better than I anticipated. I was kind of frustrated. I didn't want Google to go down this route with the quick settings panel, but the quick settings panel makes a lot more sense when you see in situ.

um it looks cleaner i mean obviously that's a that's a perfect demo isn't it obviously when we get to see these potentially in a qpr1 beta in future then It may not be quite as polished, but I kind of hope it is because they'll have more time in the oven and they've almost set expectations by revealing some of their changes.

You said with the live updates, I'm glad that they've done this with the AOD because I'd have been annoyed if they didn't. I know that obviously we only have that live in the current incarnation of Android 16.

I'm pretty sure, is it only the Easter egg that it works with right now? Yeah, maps before it, but they pulled it. Yeah, it's kind of fine, but this new interactivity with it and the integration with the... the uber eats app i think it is in a demo uh you'll find that we'll we'll leave a link in the show notes for that as well so you can check that out but yeah it just it does look more it does look a lot more

Is it in keeping with what Google is trying to do with the rest of the system? It just looks like a regular Google widget to me, but with ability to have it on your lock screen. I want to ask you about some other little changes, though. We saw some other little changes like...

You alluded to it, the status bar. I am going to be sad if we're not going to be able to revert to the traditional Pixel battery icon. I really kind of like that. They didn't really talk about customization. We don't know whether the lock screen clocks can be customized as leaked in some builds or whether that's like a Pixel 10 thing. They didn't really talk about customizing it like the app icons either. They didn't.

They really didn't go into that. Yeah, I still have to... I need to look at that battery icon every single day to see how I feel about it because I... It's very iOS-y, especially the percentage being inside the battery. And I do not like the One UI 7 one, where it's just a perfect pill. instead of anything that has definition uh so yeah i need yeah i need to wait for that um i really need to wait for that i

Also noticed something while I'm looking at it right now. It looks like we're probably going to get a new system font. Like, obviously, judging by the... the status bar and the quick settings, it doesn't look like we're going to get a more rounded. There's not going to be kind of, it's a little bit, and I don't want to use the term comic sans, but there's a little bit of like a comic sans element to it. A little bit of softness to the text that we usually had quite sharp.

It's not serif, is it? But yeah, just sans serif fonts that we've had in Android for a while and Roboto being the classic. is that is that trying to make i don't know it's literally just coming to me right now do you think that this is kind of like google trying to be a bit more approachable to everyone like friendly i don't think that's expressive i just think it's like

I guess it's softening up maybe the harder edge of what people assume Android is, I guess, maybe for US people specifically. The word, again, comes back to them using the word expressive. They want to make material you. more expressive. I obviously think that Material U was so much better branding than Material 3 Expressive, or I guess people in the know will shorthand it to M3E. But...

Again, we really need to use this. We really need to see what the haptics feel like that go with the animations, whether one will get annoyed with the springiness or whatever once you're actually with it. But overall... uh it looks consistent um and that's the most you can hope for at this point before you actually get a chance to use it yeah i'm i'm excited to try it and we're gonna hope we're gonna

Living hope that we get to see something in the next few weeks because obviously, hey, if they're going to have a QPR one beta, it's got to start at some point soon. So hopefully with that first beta, we're going to get to see some really cool stuff. But one thing I want to... Before we kind of move on to some other cool software stuff, I genuinely am surprised at how much Google lent into lilac, pink, and purple this time around for this color.

This color system, it seems to be all over the marketing. It was very much like, and it was very, very purple. I wonder what the reasoning for that is. I wonder if that's a hint that something's going to happen with Pixel 10. But hey, I'm not reading between any lines. I'm just...

just wondering, like, I love the colour purple, so yeah, I want to see some more of that. These colours are a little bit out there, a little bit different, rather than the staid, plain things that we see usually across most of the tech space. But yeah, let's get into...

Wear OS 6, which is effectively... I mean, it's an extension of this, isn't it? It's Material 3, but for a wearable. I don't think there's quite as many changes. I don't know what you think so far. I'm currently using a OnePlus watch, so I'm not using a Pixel watch at the minute. So my opinion is a bit invalid there. I am... It's... I'm... It was a complete surprise in that... Well, I guess you could assume that WayO6 is coming.

their Google has been pretty eerie about it based on Android 16 but this was a surprise through and through nothing leaked and You can compare and contrast what happened with the phones and what happened with the watches. Google got to announce Whale 6 on its own terms. They had the full hour and surprise. And I'm not sure if this is... Because we've seen the phones, we've been looking at the leaks, they've been for months and months, but the way OS6 was a breath of pressure almost.

It's interesting to see what happens when Google can present a cohesive vision on its own without any outside whatever. But yeah, bringing material tree expressive to the watch. And it's really, they're embracing the round display. They have buttons that go up to the edges. They have curved buttons. They're really maximizing the screen real estate.

And I think it's to its benefit. It's really benefiting from that. It just looks less empty. I think the tiles are a perfect example of that. Today, tiles are pretty bare.

at most show one key stat or they're very minimalist as is but uh what they have a grid isn't the right word but they have a system to maximize the buttons you can place and I think it looks really nice it looks really rich it takes it up closer to watch os and the apple watch in terms of how it kind of feels like you have a miniature phone experience on your wrist with the apple watch so it's uh maybe google balance it a bit better with the os6 and m3 but

I don't know, I'm really liking how it's, the wireless is looking less barren, less bare bones, and it has more of the material you personality that I've been living with on phones.

I think it's very interesting that Google has made some changes to the way that Wear OS is going to feel in terms of interactivity. For instance, my biggest takeaway was... And they even said this in their own blog posts is that they were saying that typing on a smartphone, smart watch screen, sorry, is, can be really irritating and finicky. Like I'm really surprised. And then. when you go look at the pin entry screen that is almost a direct

rebuttal to be like, we're going to make this easier because we're going to give you huge keypads to dial in. I mean, it looks like the Google calculator app, which I think is a good thing because it's a callback to one of their first party applications. I think.

anytime where they tie things together and i know a lot of people will criticize a lot of tech companies out there for not having cohesive visions i think tying everything together would that be that software hardware and anything else in between

By doing that, there is people who want to be in the Aircoats ecosystem because they know that their watch works exactly like the phone. And you've alluded to it. It's like a small smartphone experience. And I think that makes the most sense because as good as the Pixel Watch is. does feel a little bit, in terms of visuals anyway, without that true Material U and now Material 3 expressive, it now is going to feel a lot more closer to a Pixel phone than...

than it was at launch and in the time since. What do you think in terms of the way that they're squeezing in certain elements into this rounded display? I don't know if from the back of my mind I'm thinking this could open the door for more, not more, larger displays on wearables because you're maximizing the areas where there's quite a substantial amount of bezel. I don't know how you feel about it.

yeah the fort so personally i've actually switched to the 45 millimeter pixel watch full time as of like a month or two ago and i am very much loving the biggest screen and People wanted it for ages, but I think in the case of the Pixel Watch, the bigger screen for the sake of these animations is how you go going forward. Wear OS has always had this bare bones to it, even in Wear OS 3. So like the animations when you're scrolling the notification, it feels like...

The processor, the chips have finally caught up to having phone-level experiences on your wrist, and maybe the battery is better, with Google saying where OS X is 10% more. you get 10% more battery. So overall, I think this is such a... Even more so on the watch and on the phone. I think just because there's less UI, so to speak, what you have looks so much more cohesive. Like, it's cohesive internally.

within the watch, within the designs that they're aiming for, but also it shares so much of the phone. Like you said, the pin pad, the quick settings. All the animations there, the buttons morphing from pills to rounded rectangles when you tap on it, all that gets transmitted over from the phone. And I think absolutely for the better, it's... I'm really working. This is what I'm most excited to use more so than phones, I have to admit.

I'm only disappointed they didn't show us any new watch faces. I kind of think they've shown us the stock watch face for the Pixel Watch 3, which I'm a little bit...

disappointed by it. It's a lovely watch face, don't get me wrong. And again, it's in that purple colour. I don't know why purple and lilac seems to be the colour scheme they're going for this year. But yeah, I kind of hope that they... introduce some more watch faces that take even better advantage of it and maybe have a little bit more bounce and personality that is part of this in air quotes expressive thing the

The only other thing I would be interested in with regard to what they do with Wear OS 6 is, and I think this is just kind of more of an idea, I would love to see a bit more of crossover between tiles and widgets on Pixel phones.

the watch i feel like it would be good to have something that is effectively one-to-one like i know that you could argue that that it's a sales tactic for people to get watches but i would love to see some of these like that i know we if you go look at the the press images there's a

There's a couple of widgets for the contacts. There's one for Google Maps, I think it is, with the search and go option, which is like a smaller version of what you can get on your phone. I would love to see those almost like snapshot.

widgets put on the pixel i think it would be kind of cool to have because you could have like four or five of them on your home screen and it i mean don't get me wrong it would it would take up a fair amount of space but yeah just there is there is a opportunity there that i think nobody else seems to be taking advantage of. And I think that'd be kind of cool. Am I excited? Well, like I say, as someone who uses a OnePlus Watch 3, I am excited and it may make me switch back over, but obviously...

that 10% battery gain, does that really, will that make a difference to people day to day? Because I guess if you've had a Pixel Watch 3, you've had it nearly a year now, and obviously there's going to be battery degradation, are you going to have more than 10%? battery degradation, wearing a watch every day. I don't know. But yeah, it's always great to see these claims, whether they're backed up by real world data is another thing. But I think, yeah, I agree with you. It was the shock one.

It was one we kind of didn't expect and we're really excited by. Yeah, so those are absolutely the main points of the Android show. It's coming with Material2Expressif is coming later this year, first on Pixel.

That's something to look forward to. Again, absolutely referring to the Pixel 10. So I think the other big announcement from the Android show was Find My Device becoming Find Hub. So far, this is just... name change to reflect how back in March they added the people sharing tab and capability and how to find my device name doesn't really work with that.

just to spend a few minutes on the name, Finehub. It's an interesting one. It immediately reminds me of Grubhub. I was about to ask you about that. Yeah, it does. I mean... It's a strange one, but at the same time, I get it. It makes sense. It does make sense. It's one of those sometimes, sometimes when Google makes a decision, we're like, he's scratching your head and wondering why they've done this. I do think Find My Device could have worked on its own thing.

And then maybe they could have done what Apple has done with, is it Find My Friends? Is that still a thing? I don't know, but basically have a separate application. But I understand that having it all in one place, two tabs. is a cleaner way of doing things and then you don't have to split things away and spend extra development time and it is technically using your phone anyway so it makes sense to be within the one hub essentially um

I kind of like this decision. I do think it makes sense. And my biggest gripe with Find My Device and Find Hub in general is that it's not as robust as it still could be, you know? Yeah. I kind of, I suppose the good thing is that this update kind of coincides with the Moto tag getting that ultra wide band tracking, which gives you visual hints. So precise location.

distance yeah stuff yeah like that's kind of interesting i do think that would that is um i mean it's a good it's great timing for the moto tag it makes it more as a viable product and probably the the outright tag you should go out and buy but

There were some other interesting things in here, right? There was, we're going to get potentially, we're not potentially going to get, we're going to get suitcase brands or luggage brands that have integrated trackers in them. I think that's a really cool move. I don't know if you'd pick one up.

Or just stick to throwing one in your backpack anyway. Yeah, I just throw some in. But it's, yeah, the ecosystem is growing. That's that part of the news. The other... software announcements is that in the future The other partner announcement is it's working with carriers, with airline carriers. They're working with them to be able to, if you lose your luggage, which is something the AirTag did.

all of the offers. So yeah, that's happening. The other big announcement is satellite connectivity that you're able to use if you're out of cellular range and you're on the support device, carrier, et cetera. You can use it for occasion sharing. You can use satellite connectivity to share your occasion, maybe see other people's occasion. So that's a nice development. But yeah, FineHub.

Yes, that's coming right to this year, but the biggest announcement now is that UWB support is rolling out in May and that you should soon see an update that just makes it fine up. yeah so if you're wondering if you're trying to find find my device on your home screen search for hub or find hub um and it should change the icons staying the same the experience is practically the same i mean technically

Not probably as good as the air tag in terms of like searching for stuff, but that's by the by. I think, yeah, there are some things I really like about it. I like the fact that you can do a lot of location sharing as well. That's great. And like you say, the... the satellite connectivity could be a really good safety tool with support devices. So yeah, Pixel 8 and above on Pixel Series. Does that include a regular Pixel 8? I can't remember. The satellite connectivity?

No. Yeah, satellite connectivity? Or is it just... It's still Pixel 9. Oh, no. So, yeah, I'm thinking... Sorry, I'm thinking off device, off searching. Yeah, but yeah, the satellite connectivity, Pixel 9 and above. And a couple of, I think there's a Samsung phone in there as well. But yeah, it's all great to see anything getting evolutions, even if it does mean just adding.

removing device and putting hub at the end and this is one of those cases i like so in terms of let's look outlook because we have a huge event coming up next week we have a huge event that has now Almost being decoupled from Android. So we do expect Google to do some things I always relate to Android, but maybe not quite as headline or attention grabbing. What do we think we're going to see and what is confirmed to be seen? Because I'm...

kind of need to know this as well because I'm going to be with you there in Martin Vue next week. So to wrap up the Android show, the other big component was Gemini. But not... The biggest, because it's just Gemini coming to OS, Gemini coming to Android Auto and Automotive, Gemini coming to TV. I guess we can talk about it for a minute. Google is ending the Google Assistant charade.

There was a part earlier this year at CES, it seemed like I was going to remain the Google Assistant, but... uh they want to keep that name for home and devices for smart speakers for tvs but no that's over um they're calling it gemini mercifully and that's for the better because We'll see what happens with speakers and smart Nest displays and whatever. But on TVs, it's going to be Gemini. That's a good thing. But yeah, Gemini on Android XR when that happens.

But yeah, so in many ways, Google was clearing the, also using the Android show to clear out the minor, the more minor Gemini announcements. All Gemini and all these on where on. tvs on cars pretty straightforward you pretty much get the full experience on as you do on phones you get access to apps extensions your data etc

So they were querying that way. There was nothing about Gemini on phones in terms of new features during the Android show. And I'd expect that to be the full focus of the IO keynote. taking new practical applications, new features of Gemini for your phone, for your computer or whatever. That's going to be the full crux. of IO I'm sure and we'll see how futuristic things get but yeah that's the thing to look forward to it's like last year it's a Gemini heavy it's an AI heavy show and

You have to make a piece of that or be excited by that or whatever, but it's going to be Gemini and phones full tilt. I suppose that was one of the good things of... getting android out ahead of io it doesn't get buried in gemini news which is something that i think a lot of people will be critical of if you're like us where you i think the pair of us are kind of more

lean into the android side of things i'm definitely coming around to some of the gemini applications but yeah i think um android going out ahead of time android show going out ahead of time is a good thing i wonder if this is going to be something they do permanently um

and do it like this all the time and save all those big announcements and keep IO specifically for AI moving forward. But I guess there's going to be some fatigue from people doing it like that. I wonder how it affects viewership of IO as well. But yeah, I'm... Gemini on more form factors is always good to see. It shows that there's, I mean, obviously if Google integrates it properly, which I don't doubt they will because the rollout's been pretty solid so far. I'm excited to see it on.

AR and XR. AR and XR, I always forget. I'm bad at the namings of these. So if we get XR Extendor Reality, yeah, I want to see how it works in the real world, in the real world setting for that. Because I can imagine that could, that is the... the world facing camera that you've alluded to multiple times on this pod before, that I think where we get that true application of Gemini, Gemini needs to be a world facing camera and having contextual cues. We've seen it with the Astra powered.

Gemini Live on phones. So yeah, to be able to see that on this form factor where I think it lives effectively hand in hand with your day to day, I think it's, I'm excited to potentially get to test that next week. And whether or not we get some more information about what Samsung's doing with their Wuhan headset as well is always going to be good. But yeah.

Android-heavy I.O.? No, I think those days are longer. Yeah, I think the extent of any additional Android news will be absolutely about Android XR for better or worse. And how do you think... How do you think that's going to pan out? Because obviously there's going to be a public demo for all of attendees. You're going to get a few minutes with the headsets or the glasses sets, whatever you want to call them.

Do you think that, like, you are one of the few people I know who's been able to test this in person. Do you think this is going to be the game, like, not the game changer, how would I describe it? This could be the tastemaker. for this the application of this technology is this going to be the one that we see because it's clear lenses it's a pretty small headset i mean i know samir had it on

briefly during the show. Yeah, this is still the prototype phase. We're very far away from the Samsung thing, but this is back in December. This started in December, the previews and whatnot. And this is the continuation of that. It's not ready, but Google wants to be in a discussion. And I think I will give them a very big stage to do so. Yeah.

i'm like i say we'll get to see some more other things obviously we don't know at this stage what's happening but i'm i'm yeah new form facts is always good and getting to test them out in person I'll give you some opinions. Hopefully my opinions align with what you think about it, Abner, but we'll see, won't we, within a week's time. But yeah, IO is fast approaching.

I'm excited for it. It's always probably one of the biggest events. It is the biggest event in Google's calendar, save made by Google. But yeah, I don't anticipate any surprises. I don't know if you do, but... It kind of is what it is at this point in time. We've had our good, our... kind of our bread and butter, our main appetizer, would it be? The main course is IO. I don't know how you want to categorize it, but yeah, we will give you all of the news. We'll be there in force next week.

I will be sun-creamed up and we will be pounding the pavements of Shoreline. So yeah, stay tuned. We will bring you coverage from the event. We'll hopefully have a podcast, if I can say it, on site as well. So yeah, just... Like I say, thanks for joining us. It's been a week. It's been a week and it's going to be a week next week. Yes. Thanks, guys. And we'll speak to you soon. All right. Bye.